Sunday, 10 August 2014

Activate Courage To Pursue Your Goals

..On The Path Of Winners

BY BAYO OGUNMUPE

Activate Courage To Pursue Your Goals

MOST people give up trying to
achieve their goals even before the first day. And the reason why they give up
is because of the obstacles that appear as soon as they decide to do something
they have never done before. But as of fact, great people fail more often than
mediocre. You should expect to fail several times before you attain your goals.
Failure and temporary defeat are part of the price you pay on your road to
financial freedom. Failure is an opportunity to achieve a grand triumph.

When you decide upon your goal, identifying
all the obstacles that stand on your way. Write them down in detail. Then,
think in terms of solutions. Great people have the solution mindset. They brood
about solutions most of the time. Activate the solution orientation in your
life. Solution oriented people are always looking for solutions to their problems.
Problem oriented people always whine over their problems. Always, there are
problems between you and your goals, which is why success is often defined as
the ability to solve problems. And leadership is the ability to solve problems.
So is effectiveness. Thus, champions are people who have developed the ability
to solve the problems that stand between them and their goals.

Problem solving is a skill that you must
acquire. A skill is like riding a bicycle or typing with a typewriter or
keyboard, which you can learn. The more you focus on solutions, the more and
better solutions come to you. The better you get at solving problems, the
faster you get at gaining your goals. The faster you are solving problems, the
more you solve problems that can have significant financial impact for you and
others. This is how the world works. You can win because you have all the
intelligence and ability you will ever need to overcome any obstacle on the
path of your purpose. Celebrate your journey, not your destination. Always feel
good about where you are now, and confident about where you will be tomorrow.

Incidentally, there have been important
breakthroughs in decision-making. This was described by Eliyahu Goldratt in his
book, The Goal, as ‘‘the theory of constraints.” This theory says that between
you and anything you want to achieve, - there is a constraint or limiting
factor. That determines how fast you get to where you want to be. For example,
if you are driving down a freeway and traffic construction is narrowing the
vehicles into a single lane. This bottleneck becomes the constraint that
determines how fast you will get to your destination. The speed at which you
pass through this bottleneck largely determines the speed of your entire
journey.

In achieving your goal, your ability to
remove this bottleneck will help you move ahead faster than any other step you
can take. Yet, there is another rule of constraint. This rule says eighty per
cent of your constraints are within you. Only twenty per cent of your constraints
are outside of yourself, contained in other people, and situations. Put another
way, it is you personally who is the roadblock that is setting the speed at
which you achieve your goal.

For most people, it is hard to accept that
you are your own enemy. But great people are more concerned with what is right
rather than who is right. Champions are more concerned with the truth of the
situation and the solution to the problem than they are with protecting their
ego. Ask what is in you that is holding you back. Is it hate? Hate is like
acid, it damages the container in which it is stored and destroys the vessel on
which it is poured. To be safe, hate no one!

Identify the key constraints in your
personality, skills, ability, habits, education and experience that might be
holding you back from financial freedom. Be completely honest with yourself.
Here in Nigeria, we fail more often because of jealousy, hatred, greed and
cowardice. We trust nebulous and superstitious beliefs such as luck, destiny,
fate and various other myths. In a nation that has commercialized education,
religion and politics, working creatively is the safest road to prosperity.

The first obstacle to success is the fear of
failure. It is why the average man tries to achieve a new goal only once. Fears
overwhelm him, which extinguish his desire for success completely. The second
mental obstacle closely aligned to fear is self doubt. He doubts his own
abilities. He compares himself unfavourably to others, thinking others are
better than himself. But happily, negative emotions can be unlearned. You can
unlearn through practice and repetition. The antidotes to fear and doubt are
courage and confidence. The higher the level of your courage and confidence,
the lower your levels of fear and doubt.

The keys to courage and confidence are
knowledge and skill. Fear and doubt arise from ignorance and inadequate skill
in matters relating to your subject. The more you acquire what you need to
achieve your goals, the less you fear and doubt. The third mental obstacle you
need to overcome is the comfort zone. You are in your comfort zone when you
become complacent with your present status. You become so comfortable in your
job or relationship such that you become reluctant to make any changes at all,
even for the better. This comfort zone is a major obstacle to ambition, desire,
determination and accomplishment. People who are stuck in a comfort zone can be
helpless. Don’t let this happen to you.

The way to evade obstacles is to list them in
writing. To remove any obstacle, first define it in several ways before you
solve it. Accurate diagnosis is half the cure. By accurate definition, you
solve the problem. There is always a solution to any problem somewhere. Find
the solution. Our champion this week is William Tecumseh Sherman, American
civil war general and the architect of modern warfare. He led the union forces
in crushing campaigns in 1864-5.

Named Tecumseh in honour of the renowned
American Indian chieftain, Sherman was born in February 1820, in Lancaster,
Ohio. He was one of eight children of Judge Charles Sherman who died when the
boy was nine. Thomas Ewing, a family friend and a Stalwart Whig politician
adopted Tecumseh and his foster mother added William to his name.

At 16, Ewing obtained an appointment to West
Point Military Academy for him. Sherman graduated on top of his class in 1840.
Thereafter, he was sent to fight Seminole Indians in Florida. In 1850, he
married Ellen Ewing, daughter of his adoptive father. Ewing was then serving as
the secretary of the Interior in Washington D.C. The new family settled in St.
Louis. He resigned from the army to join a bank at its branch in California.
The panic of 1857 interrupted his promising career in business and later
friends found him employment in January 1860 as superintendent of a newly
established military academy in Louisiana.

When Louisiana seceded from the union in
1861, Sherman resigned his appointment. Then he obtained an appointment in the
U.S. Army as a colonel. He was soon assigned to command a brigade in General
Irvin McDowell’s army, fighting in the Battle of Bull Run. Later he was
promoted Brigadier.

President Abraham Lincoln thereafter sent him
to Kentucky as second in command to General Robert Anderson. Later he became a
divisional commander under General Ulysses Grant where Sherman distinguished
himself at the Battle of Shiloh in 1862 – winning promotion to major general.
Together with Grant they won victories in Vicksburg and Fort Hindman.

When Grant assumed supreme command in the
west, Sherman commanded the armies of Mississippi. Then Sherman presented
Savannah to Lincoln as Christmas gift in 1864. By February 1865, he was
approaching Virginia where General Robert Lee surrendered to Grant in the
closing battles of the civil war. Sherman succeeded Grant as the head of the
army. When Grant became President in 1869, he made Sherman commanding General
of the Army, a post he held until 1884. He declined all entreaties to run for
office. Sherman was one of the ablest union generals in the civil war. His
march to the sea is regarded as the first example of total war in modern
warfare. He died in 1891 a week after his 71st birthday.

Bayo Ogunmupe

About Me

Bayo Ogunmupe is a veteran Journalist, economist and literary critic. He was born in Osun state, Nigeria. He was educated at the international School, Ibadan, Oyo state, Nigeria, the University of Ibadan and the University of Geneva, Switzerland, the London School of Economics, UK.
He was Production Editor, Nigerian Tribune, Ibadan, and Senior Sub-Editor at Daily Times Newspaper in Lagos. Ogunmupe was Associate Editor of Newswatch Magazine, He was a recipient of the Nigerian Media Merit Awards in 1993 and the Ladi Lawal Journalist of the year, 2010. He is columnist for the Guardian newspaper since 1993. He is the author of Nigerian Politics in the Age of Yar'Adua. Chief Ogunmupe is available for lectures, seminars and leadership workshops or conferences in any part of the world. He can be reached at ogunmupeb@yahoo.com